The Bureau of Land Management s new Front Range District Manager, Tom Heinlein, is sworn in by BLM Colorado State Director, Helen Hankins, right, and Leah Quesenberry, associate district manager, Thursday at the BLM Royal Gorge Field Office.
(Carie Canterbury/Daily Record)

The Bureau of Land Management's new Front Range District Manager, Tom Heinlein, received a warm welcome Thursday during a swearing-in ceremony at the BLM Royal Gorge Field Office.

"My family and I are extremely happy to be settling in Colorado," he said. "I look forward to meeting and working with the people who enjoy this area's beautiful public lands."

Heinlein replaces Greg Shoop who took another job with the National BLM office as Department Assistant Director.

Heinlein came to Colorado from Monticello, Utah, where he was a BLM Field Manager since 2008. In 1996, he received a Master of Science in forest ecology from Northern Arizona University. He has worked as a research fire ecologist with the Northern Arizona University Ecological Restoration Institute, a biologist with the National Park Service Arctic Inventory and Monitoring Network, the Chief of Natural and Cultural Resources and Assistant Park Supervisor for Western Arctic National Parklands, and as the Superintendent of the Bering Land Bridge National Preserve.

Heinlein and his wife, Kim, have wanted to move to Colorado for quite some time, he said, for a variety of reasons.

"It's the resources, with two field offices in the district and the statewide organization," he said. "BLM Colorado is a leader and it's a well-known, good-to-work-for entity.

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As District Manager, Heinlein is responsible for overseeing BLM's management of public lands and natural resources from the continental divide east to the Kansas border, and from the Wyoming border south to the New Mexico and Oklahoma borders.

More than 50 people attended Thursday's ceremony, including County Commissioner Ed Norden.

"Heinlein brings with him extensive leadership experience and natural resource knowledge that will greatly benefit the BLM," said Helen Hankins, BLM Colorado State Director.

The BLM's Front Range District manages nearly 1.3 million surface acres and 9.5 million subsurface acres of federal mineral estate. The District is comprised of the local Royal Gorge Field Office, the Arkansas Headwaters Recreation Area in Salida and the San Luis Valley Field Office in Saguache.

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